Visa troubles for Indian passport holders is unending. I have had my share of them. This particular time it was my parents’ turn.
Two years ago, the time seemed right to have my parents over. We were married for over a year, had settled into our apartment and had both got a grip of our jobs. My wife looked forward to hosting her in-laws, even took up the planning for their visit. The broad outline for my parents’ Eurotrip was to follow the template. I wanted them to see some of the Eiffel-Towers, Colloseums and Big-Bens of Europe. And of course, stay a few days with us in Germany, in our home away from home.
At the outset, we ruled out the option of showing them around Europe ourselves. That would mean too much planning effort and too much time off work for us. The more convenient and efficient option would be to send them on one of those package tours. In comparison to a self-organized tour, a package tour could cover more tourist destinations, offer better hotels and drive the tourists around in a comfortable bus. And thanks to tough competition and group booking, package tours might even work out cheaper. The travel agency we short-listed even offered visa services, flexible flight dates and Indian food during the trip. To summarize – we would get more, do little and pay lesser. It was a no-brainer. Or so it seemed!
The hitch in the otherwise perfect arrangement was the required deviation from the standard tour itinerary. To accommodate their stay with us after the package tour, their visa application and return flight booking had to be made separate from the rest of the travel group. We were particularly concerned about the postponed flight back to India drawing suspicion of European visa authorities. Therefore we intended to start the visa procedures early, have enough time to arrange the required documents and submit the application in good time - thus allowing sufficient time for visa processing.
But unfortunately for us, our contact person at the local travel agency office was neither experienced nor organized enough to manage the visa procedures for us. Instead of a checklist of required documents and payments with due dates - as one would expect, she sent us a series of panic-stricken emails, of the kind – “please provide this document immediately” or “please make that payment immediately”. With my wife coordinating from Germany, the travel agency and my parents working together in India, the different time zones and thus different working hours, there was total chaos! To top it all, she only managed to file the visa application less than 2 weeks before start of the tour!
And our worst nightmare came true – five days before my parents were to board a plane to Europe, their tourist visa got rejected! Reason quoted for rejection was non-specific – “submitted documents are incomplete or insufficient”, without mentioning which documents were being referred to. We were shocked and dumb-founded. Coincidentally, I was visiting India without my wife for a cousin’s wedding and thus happened to be available for fire-fighting. After some calls to the head-office of the travel agency and discussion with my wife, I set out on the next course of action. We filed a reapplication, attached additionally with my covering letter in German language. The chances were however quite thin – excluding the weekend, we had only three working days left, which was also the best-case visa processing time. In other words, it would take a miracle.
And not just any ‘ordinary’ miracle would do. As if things were not complicated enough, the flight to Europe would take off in three days working days from Mumbai International Airport. So my parents had to take a domestic flight from our hometown of Mangaluru to Mumbai one day in advance. Meaning – the visa, if approved, would have to be delivered to them in Mumbai.
To summarize: extraordinary miracle = visa that has been rejected, gets issued on reapplication with the same substantial documents + that too in best-case visa processing time + the travel agency manages to get the visa delivered to my parents at Mumbai airport during their flight changeover time!
But guess what?! EXTRAORDINARY MIRACLE HAPPENED!!! Even before my parents took the domestic flight, the travel agency informed us that the visa had been issued and the stamped passports were on their way to Mumbai by speed post. It would be a race against the clock for my parents, the passports and the departing flight. And it was a photo finish. On arrival in Mumbai, a delivery boy drove the passports to the airport and handed it over to my parents, just in time for their security check before the international flight. The rest of their trip would be exciting in less dramatic ways, captured in fond memories and digital photographs.
For the second time in a week, we were shocked and dumb-founded! What the hell really happened?! Had the travel agency just screwed up the first application? Did the covering letter in German language do the trick the second time?! OR, was it just what it was – a miracle. Well, we did not really care in the end. All’s well that, …
This year, my in-laws will be taking the ride. There are definitely a few things we will do differently this time. No prizes for guessing what tops the list!
